Fractured
by MournfulSeverity
Summary: With the end of Voldemort, they foolishly thought it would be the end to their pain as well. Instead, the trio has lived the following year trying to find themselves, trying to put themselves back together. Now, on the one year anniversary of Voldemort's defeat they get to remember who they lost and begin the path to healing.


**Disclaimer: Everything belongs to JK Rowling**

**This one shot was created for the Hermione's Nook Collection. It needed to be between 500 and 1000 words and resulted in 811. My one word prompt was "Holiday".**

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7 years. That's how long she had spent in this place. 68 months. 1,793 days. Many of those had been happy, filled with the hope of an uncomplicated education and nothing more. But, it had changed each year, had grown heavier and harder to bear.

Hermione had watched Harry crumble beneath the weight of it. Beneath the misplaced guilt, the responsibility a child should never have to carry. And then they were on the run. Flitting in and out of forests and cities. They had begun their journey fueled by luck, hope, only to be blessed with disappointment.

Months of starvation, of not enough, of cold and pain. That's how they had lived, and it had taken its toll on each of them. But, it had ended here , inside this castle that had always been apart of each of them. It had ended in victory, the reign of terror coming to an end after totalling nearly 15 years.

It had been a year since that day.

The once cracked stone of Hogwarts had been polished, the dust mended into bricks once more. Blood that glittered with magic had once seeped into every crevice, coated walls. Coated people. But, it had been washed clean and the school had become whole again. Any stain of what had happened here now wiped away.

The castle had been repaired, but she still felt a fragility inside herself. She had expected the war to end with Voldemort's defeat. Instead, she now fought a war against her own mind.

She had returned to Hogwarts to finish her education, had walked these walls a final year. Walls that echoed with the souls that had been lost here. There were days she wanted to cry alongside them, that the imposing halls of stone threatened to cave in on her. In that year, her lungs had felt incapable of expanding. As if the castle had been depleted of all oxygen.

There were too many people who had expected the Hermione she had been before, never accounting for the fact she had lost herself in the war. Had been replaced by a version of herself she had never known, a shell of who she'd been before. Voldemort's victims hadn't only been created by death.

Hermione could feel her hands tremble even now as she stood inside the courtyard. Water rushed from the fountain that sat in the center, drowning out the voices of the people who crowded in front of her. The hushed whispers of memoriam. But, it did nothing to cover the thoughts that rattled painfully inside her own head.

She'd seen the eyes of people she loved glossed over by death, staring into the infinite that she couldn't see. She had grown used to the scent of blood, the copper that singed her with fear. Grown used to spells that carved into her flesh and haunted her even now.

This day had been made a holiday, as if there was any reason to be happy about the people they had lost along the way. Friends, comrades, professors, people she had never even known. Children.

She was ready to be free of a war that had taken claim of her existence, that had etched her name into historical records and made her appearance at this memorial a necessity. She was ready to move on. Ready to heal. Looking out at the sea of people that had attended this event, at the red rimmed eyes and cheeks blotched with tears, it was easy to see that she wasn't the only one.

She reached out, finding Harry's hand beside her. While she had been a victim of the war in many ways, Harry had been an instrument, a catalyst, a weapon. He had lost even his own life to spare the rest of them. Had given it up without question.

He had made the difficult choices, had cast his own spells against Voldemort. Had been connected, destined before his birth. Before he'd ever fully existed. His name would be tied to Voldemort's all his life, would be followed with "the boy who lived" even though he now stood beside her a man.

She found Ron's fingers next, squeezing them as their fingers intertwined. The final fight had perhaps hurt him most of all. Had stolen a brother from a family that had always exemplified perfection. Had given Ron an unbearable pain when all he had known in life was love. A pain that seemed to pour out of him.

On a stage that had been conjured for just this occasion, the three of them stood hand in hand. She could see her emotions mirrored in each of their faces, distraught and happiness having combined into a singular feeling none of them could describe. They were fractured, haunted, but survivors all the same and today it was their duty to pay respects once more to the people who hadn't been as lucky.


End file.
